As any marketing manager knows, marketing budgets took a real hammering last year. It is sometimes seen as an easy first cut to make - reports show that around 60% of all marketing budgets were reduced in 2009. Some confidence has been restored this year, with marketing managers showing more optimism to invest, but the need to show restraint and resourcefulness will be a recurring theme until the end of this year I suspect.
Businesses are always under pressure to do more for less, to reduce cost per sale, ultimately to protect sales margins. Ironically, this period of downturn has also been mirrored by the exponential rise of social media which has opened up a raft of new opportunities for marketers to engage with their stakeholders. So, how can marketing managers first tune-up their websites ready for social media and the benefits for search engine optimisation (SEO) and also take full advantage of opportunities from ‘free’ social media without burning through their time and budget?
Before you dive in on Twitter, LinkedIn or Facebook, there are some foundations you need to put in place first to get ready for social media and that means looking at your website. Your website is your shop window on the web, the place you want your social media traffic to go. Directing visitors back to your website is where you can capitalise on sales leads (or sales if you have an ecommerce site) and also benefit from 'organic' SEO.
Like any good marketing activity, planning is essential. Your strategy for your website and your social media activity has to tie in and support your overall business strategy. Is your targeting correct – if you are unsure, this is the time to use tools such as brainstorming or mind-mapping to research and evaluate the audiences you need to reach.
Organic SEO means letting the strength of your web site content, news flows, in bound links (links from other websites) and social media activity help drive up your website hits, search results and rankings, rather than spending more money with SEO agencies or Pay-Per-Click (PPC) campaigns. Companies spend a great deal of money with SEO specialists to help inch up the search engine page rankings, but we now know that the best way to do this is by using relevant, researched, keyword rich content. Your SEO agency and social media efforts need to be intertwined. If your SEO agency has not mentioned anything about social media you need to ask why. With a concerted campaign to push organic SEO, your SEO and PPC spend should ease; at the very least you will arrest its rise.
Search engine friendly
First base for your website is having a site that is search engine friendly such as a content management system (CMS) that makes your site open for quick and easy consumption by search engines such as Google. If Google cannot easily read your site, then you are not being indexed by Google which means you are not even on the radar. This does not mean an expensive upgrade. Open source CMS’ such as Wordpress or Joomla are ideal. They can easily incorporate all your social media tools such as blogs, RSS feeds, Twitter feeds, bookmarking and so on. Including a simple site map of your web site, with a ‘sitemap.xml’ file provides an instant index for search engines to use to crawl through your website.
Steer clear of overusing Java-based scripts and Macromedia Flash graphics especially for the front pages of your website, as the search engines cannot read it as they would have to run the application first. Sites can be optimised for SEO by ensuring keyword-rich text is included extensively into web page content. Registering for free website directories such as The Open Directory is another 'must-do' on your SEO task list.
Article Source : http://www.mycustomer.com/topic/marketing/social-media-marketing-and-seo-how-have-success-shoestring/109868
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